UNDERSTANDING THE POEM

Stanza 1 The poem starts with the three words, “Half a league” repeated three times.

• It sets up a rhythm – like a military march.

• A league is an old-fashioned measurement of distance that’s approximately equivalent to five kilometres. So, half a league is about two and half kilometres.

The phrase “the valley of Death” tends to make us feel a little scared and uncertain. Thus far, it tells us that someone is covering a certain distance in a scary place. Next, we learn that there are six hundred people, and that they are riding, probably on horseback.

In Line 5 – the phrase “Forward, the Light Brigade! – it seems that someone is commanding; shouting out a military order to move forward.

We don’t know who this person is, but he introduces the heroes of this poem, the fearless men of the Light Brigade! A “brigade” is a way of dividing up an army. They are “cavalry” soldiers, meaning they are riding on horseback.

They are called “Light” to separate them from the “Heavy Brigade,” another kind of cavalry unit at the time.

The end of stanza one shows that the brigade has been ordered into the valley, and they’re riding in, even though they know that guns and death are waiting for them.

Stanza 2 Stanza 2 begins with the order “Forward, the Light Brigade!” repeated. The speaker really wants us to focus on those words, on the command to move forward.

The men are being sent to death. It makes us pause and think about why these brave men are being sent into “the valley of Death.” • Line 10 – Was there a man dismayed? – shows that perhaps now the readers are trying to get a peek into the heads of these soldiers, trying to imagine how it must feel to charge towards death.

In this poem, “to be dismayed” means to lose your courage, to be overcome by terror. The word “not,” in line 11 implies that these men do not feel discouraged at all. They are ready to do their job.

Lines 13 to 15 – “Theirs not to make reply, Theirs not to reason why, Theirs but to do and die” – sum up all of the honest, humble heroism of these men.

They are just doing their job. The last two lines “Into the valley of Death”; “Rode the six hundred” are the same as the last two lines in the first stanza. It emphasises the main action of the poem, which is the men riding to their death.

Stanza 3 The soldiers are surrounded by enemy – cannon, left, right, and front.

It’s almost as if we are right there, turning our heads right, left, and forward, and seeing cannons everywhere.

A “volley” from a cannon is just a round of firing. Referring to lines 25, instead of “Into the valley of Death,” now the men are riding “Into the mouth of hell”.

It’s one more way of emphasising how bad the situation in the valley is and how brave these men are.